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- As we'd suspected, all hardware that isn't made by Google itself (aside from accessories and Nest) has been dropped from the Google Store. Hoi Lam, a Googler who works on Android Wear, confirmed this, and that it had been in the works for a while. New storefronts like Amazon's have been custom-made for Wear.
Android Wear isn't an especially popular platform these days, but plenty of people still use it - enough for Google to have released two new smartwatches, the LG Watch Sport and Watch Style, earlier this year. But just eight months after their release, the Android Wear page has disappeared from the Google Store's home page. And more interestingly, both the Watch Sport and Watch Style are now marked as "no longer available."
Smartwatches continue to dwindle, it seems. Android Wear, as a platform, still has a long way to go. If you can look past its shortcomings, then perhaps eBay's Labor Day deal is for you. Right now, you can pick up either an LG Watch Sport for $199.99 (saving you a very nice $150) or an LG Watch Style for $107.99 (a total of $142 off of the MSRP), if you use a coupon.
At launch, the LG Watch Sport cost a whopping $349, putting it on the higher end of the Android Wear market. In fairness, it did pack a lot of features, but $350 is still a hard pill to swallow for a smartwatch. But now, you can get a brand new Watch Sport for just $239.99 - a substantial $110 off the original MSRP - at Daily Steals.
When the LG Watch Sport was announced, Verizon was on the list of carriers that would sell it. However, it's been three months since then, and Verizon still hasn't made it available for sale, with nothing being shipped to pre-orderers. It turns out that the chunky device has been completely canceled for Big Red.
By now, you must know a lot about the new LG Style and Sport watches and all that they can and can't do. What you don't know is a little added functionality that's just handy to have, even if it won't have that much impact on your daily use.
After confirming with Google, we've learned that Android Pay for Android Wear will not function if your paired smartphone has an unlocked bootloader. This is not surprising, but it is disappointing nonetheless. This is despite the fact that we know the actual Wear app runs totally independently on the smartwatch, with the phone at most acting as a data pipe over Bluetooth. But the phone is integral in the actual setup process for Pay, and we suspect this may be where the limitation comes into play.
Android Pay for Android Wear (which is a mouthful) is easily the most-requested feature in Google's wearable OS, and probably has been since Wear was first announced. It's taken a while - a long while, if you ask me - but it's finally here with the announcement of the LG Watch Sport. The Watch Sport is, for now, the only Android Wear smartwatch that supports Android Pay. No legacy devices are receiving the feature as far as we know.
